The United Nations children’s agency has said that a polio vaccination campaign to inoculate more than 640,000 children in Gaza is surpassing expectations at the end of the first phase of the programme.
Describing the campaign as a “rare bright spot” in almost 11 months of war, Unicef said that 189,000 children had been reached so far as more than 500 teams were deployed across central Gaza this week.
It said Israel and Hamas observed limited pauses in the fighting to facilitate the campaign, with UN agencies involved now hoping to expand the campaign to the harder-hit north and south of the territory for the next two phases.
I’m not terribly surprised, since whatever either side says is largely detached from what is really going on on the ground.
For instance, Israel has stated that it allows the vaccinations to take place, but four days ago blew up one of the aid trucks organized by a group called Anera after it had already been authorized for transit.
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/30/middleeast/israeli-strike-gaza-aid-convoy-intl-latam/index.html
Now, the IDF claims that the truck was hijacked by armed militants. Anera said that the truck was not hijacked, it was staffed with local Palestinian delivery drivers who asked to drive at the last minute, but also admitted that they were not among the people that the IDF had pre-aproved.
So we can see here that the IDF blows people up in a deconflicted setting. But I’ll say something critics of Israel often won’t: I can’t guarantee that none of those drivers were actually part of Hamas. Would it surprise me if Hamas and the IDF agreed to peacefully allow vaccinations without interference and BOTH broke that agreement? No. Israel doesn’t follow the rules of engagement, nor does Hamas. What either side says they agree to is not a reliable source of what is happening. Both say whatever they think sounds good and then their fighters do whatever the hell they like. Neither side is honest or in control of their fighters, so nothing anyone says really matters that much.
I understand your point here, but the “both sides bad” really loses the plot when the death, destruction and suffering by the most innocent is astronomically asymmetrical.
at this juncture I don’t give a shit if every combatant is the devil himself. stop the flow of kid killing weaponry and get appropriate humanitarian aid in.
20fucking24 and we still cannot pull our thumbs out of our collective asses, put the homicidal money machine into neutral and stop mowing down kids. fuck us all, every goddamn one of us.
I agree with all of that. It’s tough to talk about because I really hate to give any impression of moral equivalence. I think the leaders on both sides are equivalent in their hearts, but in actions and outcomes there’s simply no contest. Israel’s killers are much, much, much more brutally effective. At least several hundred times so in numbers. Very possibly a thousand times so.
When I speak of Hamas, it’s largely for the purpose of trying to understand their behavior.
We need to get passed the idea that the mere presence of a Hamas member justifies all military action. Assuming it is true, what were those Hamas members doing?
Throwing away the vaccines to use the marked car for transporting weapons and fighters? Valid military target (and a war crime)
Assisting in distributing polio vaccines? Not a valid target.